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Rutaceae family

Shaddock Citrus maxima

Shaddock is an introduced perennial tree, found in the Pacific Basin and Puerto Rico. It grows to 16 ft.

More about this plant

The pomelo, also known as a shaddock, is the largest citrus fruit. It is an ancestor of several cultivated citrus species, including the bitter orange and the grapefruit. It is a natural, non-hybrid citrus fruit, native to Southeast Asia. Similar in taste to a sweet grapefruit, the pomelo is commonly eaten and used for festive occasions throughout Southeast and East Asia. As with the grapefruit, phytochemicals in the pomelo have the potential for drug interactions. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Height · Foliage
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
Height
16 ft
Lifespan
Perennial
Foliage
Evergreen broadleaf
In the garden
Shrub layer — Sits in the shrub of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles
Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →
❧ Caterpillar hosts ~1 caterpillar species

Citrus supports ~1 caterpillar species.

Native butterfly & moth caterpillars are the base of the terrestrial food web — most songbirds rear their young almost entirely on them. As a host for native Lepidoptera this is a modest genus for introduced plants — native genera typically support far more.

Recorded feeding on Citrus in North America, including:

Amyelois transitella · Navel Orangeworm ✦ Argyrotaenia citrana · leafroller moth ✦ Cryptothelea gloverii · bagworm moth ✦ Oxydia vesulia · Spurge Spanworm Moth ✦ Platynota rostrana · Omnivorous Platynota Moth ✦ Protorthodes rufula · Rufous Quaker ✦
+ 8 more species →
Pyroderces badia · cosmet moth ✦ Rothschildia lebeau · giant silk moth ✦ Spodoptera eridania · Southern Armyworm ✦ Spodoptera latifascia · Velvet Armyworm Moth ✦ Syntomeida ipomoeae · Yellow-Banded Wasp Moth ✦ Acharia stimulea · Saddleback Caterpillar Moth Agrotis ipsilon · Dark Sword-Grass Amorbia cuneanum · leafroller moth
Keystone count (genus-level) from Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use records. Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0). ✦ = recorded on this exact species.
✦ Bees 2 bee visitors
Visitor records (observations, not exhaustive) from Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI →
Wildlife & visitors 4 birds · 12 mammals · 1 nectaring

Open records of who else uses Shaddock — a generalist food-web signal, kept separate from the keystone Ecological Value.

1 adult butterfly & moth species is recorded nectaring at its flowers:

Seseria formosana
Interaction records (observations, not exhaustive) from GloBI → (CC0). Counts are distinct species; names are the most-recorded. Common names from Wikidata (CC0).
Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.
How we know this (2) Methods & honest limits
Leaf build Direct fact

We read each species’ measured specific leaf area (leaf area per unit dry weight) from the Global Spectrum dataset and band it: thin & fast (high SLA), medium, or thick & tough (low SLA). The global median is about 10 mm²/mg.

Honest limits: A species-mean from pooled measurements — individual plants vary with light and site. A broad strategy signal, not a precise per-plant figure.

Díaz, S. et al. (2022) The global spectrum of plant form and function: enhanced species-level trait dataset. Scientific Data 9:755.
Photosynthesis Direct fact

A recorded categorical fact: each species is tagged C3 (standard), C4 (heat/water-efficient) or CAM (succulent, night-time CO₂ uptake) — or a facultative combination. We only show a trait card for the noteworthy C4/CAM cases; C3 is the unremarkable majority, kept in the data but not surfaced as a card.

Kattge, J. et al. TRY plant trait database — Categorical Traits Dataset (2012).
Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →
Sources for this entry (20) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[05] Invasive / introduced status — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — native status
[07] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[08] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[11] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[12] Photosynthetic pathway — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[13] Wildlife & visitors — GloBI — Global Biotic Interactions (CC0)
[17] Flower-visitor value (derived) — Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI
[18] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[19] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
[20] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county
Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.
Cite this page Open data, please attribute

PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

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